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Actor Sanjeev Kumar was sure that he would never get married, because he had an underlying heart condition and felt that his partner would have to deal with it unfairly. He was also fond of his drink, and would host friends every night at his house. According to his biographer, Hanif Zaveri, and his niece, Jigna, the actor fondly known as Haribhai didn’t want to burden his spouse with his lifestyle, but he came close to breaking his rule twice; first with Hema Malini, and then with Nutan. But the latter was already married at the time, and was horrified at the idea of the world finding out.
In an interview with Vickey Lalwani, Hanif and Jigna recalled the chain of events leading up to the moment when Nutan slapped Sanjeev in public. “The affair began during the making of Devi. In fact, the film’s director, Madhusudhana Rao, played Cupid between them. But the relationship fizzled out,” the said. However, it didn’t fizzle out without an explosion first. Hanif Zaveri said that Sanjeev Kumar’s sister told him how Nutan ended up slapping him in front of a crew.
He said, “A day before the incident, Sanjeev Kumar found out that Mr and Mrs Nutan were having an argument at home. So, he called up her husband, Rajnish Bahl, and tried to get him to calm down; it only made matters worse, and Nutan’s husband became angrier. Sanjeev Kumar made the gesture in good faith, but her husband became incensed. The next day, just to prove to her husband that she wasn’t having an affair with Sanjeev Kumar, she came to set and slapped him in front of everyone.”
The shooting came to a halt, as both stars went their separate ways. Sanjeev Kumar headed to his friend Aspi Irani’s house on Napeansea Road, and was strictly advised not to breathe a word of it to anyone, especially the press. “He didn’t speak about it to anyone ever,” they said. Sanjeev Kumar was also involved with Hema Malini, but their relationship ended because he wanted her to quit acting and become a housewife. The heartbreak was so deep that he refused to work with her in films going forward, while Hema’s husband, Dharmendra, reciprocated by refusing to share the screen with him. Sanjeev Kumar died at the age of 47 in 1985. Nutan died in 1991, at the age of 54.
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